Birdsall Wedding

This was another rainy early summer wedding day, but Megan and Ben must doing something right as it cleared up beautifully right before the reception started. I love summer because we have these gorgeous outdoor, open air receptions and ceremonies. It makes for such a green, vibrant setting with the grass, trees, and flowers all around. I love it!
The wedding was at the Oquirrh Mountain Temple, which is a neat one to shoot as a wedding photographer because the grounds are so different. Instead of big, leafy trees, you have a lot of smaller trees and smaller vegetation with the new landscaping. It's a big, open feeling as you look around you down to the valley below.

And doesn't Megan look beautiful?? I hope you know, Ben, that you lucked out with such a pretty wife.. ;)

I love seeing older people dancing- I hope that will be me in 30-40 years.

I met Amber at this reception, she expressed interest in learning about photography, and now she is doing an internship with me. I love being able to teach, not just do. I'm grateful for the photographers who helped me get started, and I'll try to pass it on.

and.... POLKA DOTS!

We took ten minutes in the middle of the reception to take a couple photos and show off the beautiful sky. I love the blue and clouds.

I'll finish off the post with some of the cutest kids I have come across at a reception. I think one of the best parts of my job is seeing all the adorable outfits these little kids get put into. Look at the pocket square on this first little one's vest!!

This next little girl was really rocking out- she even had her own backup dancers...

Check out the full gallery for the wedding here.

Katie and Chris- Explosions of cuteness and color

About a year ago, I took an entrepreneurship class at BYU. I take a class every now and then with the intention of graduating one day. Working 60 hours a week on weddings doesn't leave a ton of time for homework. ;) In the class we got divided up into groups, and a large majority of our grade involved starting a brand new business and generating a specific amount of revenue by the end of the semester.

Given my existing business, I saw this as a wonderful way to kill two birds with one stone. We started up an advertising business for our first (and primary) client- Whitney Lewis Photography LLC. It was fun, successful, and we found some very effective ways to increase my market exposure at the time. Another happy side effect of this class was that several of the class members were able to find a superbly talented, creative, and outstandingly attractive photographer for their own weddings!

Erin and Cole booked me to shoot their wedding in Newport Beach, CA, which we did just a couple weeks ago. Katie and Chris were looking to book me for their wedding in October in Oakland, CA, but unfortunately I was already scheduled on their wedding day (headed back out to my hometown Austin, TX though! oh yeah!). So we ended up booking an engagement session, and might be doing a formal bride and groom session before the wedding. I love formals, and think that every bride and groom should do them. They frequently produce the best photos from the entire wedding package, they are low stress, and a great trial run before the wedding. Plus, we get to pick the perfect time of day to shoot and lots of fun locations. But I'm getting distracted.

We started Katie and Chris' engagements at the Tahitian Noni Gardens (officially the "Morinda Gardens"), and finished up at the Riverwoods Mall nearby. They were both so cute during the shoot; I loved how their personalities really came through and that how happy they were was able to just pop in every photo. It seems to jump out at you, sprinkling happiness all over your monitor screen. As an additional bonus, Katie used to be a dancer; I love working with dancers because they are often so easy to pose and natural in front of the camera. Katie was simultaneously elegantly graceful and stinking cute. It was great!

"Scooch on over closer, dear...." :)

But my favorite part of this shoot was how cute and colorful Katie's outfits were. I suggested that they bring a few different outfits with different colors, and she showed up to the shoot with this enormous duffel bag. I'm pretty sure it contained her whole closet. It kind of made me feel like I was ten years old again, playing dress up. So fun!

See Katie and Chris' complete engagement gallery here.

Allison and Darron: Pre-wedding day formals at Santa Monica Pier

I'm originally from Austin, Texas, which I once thought to be a fairly big city. I live now in Lehi, Utah, which is definitely NOT a big city. Neither location really educated me on what "bad traffic" can really mean. I was actually pretty naive when it came to such things, and didn't really understand how horrendous a traffic situation can really be. NO LONGER!

We met up with Allison and Darron at the Los Angeles LDS Temple to shoot some bride and groom photos the day before their wedding (bridals/groomals/pre-wedding-vanity-shoot, call it whatever you like :), and when we finished, we headed on over to the Santa Monica Pier to finish the rest of the evening. It's only a hair over 5 miles from the Temple to the Pier, and I figured even with "bad" traffic we'd get there in about 30 minutes. ...About an hour and a half later we pull into the parking garage a block away from the Pier, and I am ready to pull out my hair.

This was fairly representative of the traffic situation during our trip down there. We fought with "Jeeves" our friendly GPS unit the whole way about whether or not we dared get onto a freeway while we were down there. It seemed like "rush hour" was actually from about 8am-11:30am and then again from 12:00pm-8pm.

Anyways, once we got to the Pier everything was great. Allison was completely gorgeous in her dress (even after close to two hours in the car getting there), and we ended up getting some really fun images. There were THOUSANDS of people around the Pier and the beach, which made Allison and Darron feel a little out of place in their wedding clothes, but they were awesome! Seriously, if I were on the other side of the camera I would have died. We even had an audience that spontaneously started cheering when they did their first kiss for the camera. Darron was so cute about the process- once he realized that we were going to have an audience for the remainder of the evening, he made the joke that he would just tell people that they were models just doing their job. So the whole time, he just said over and over under his breath "It's ok, I'm a model." It made for a fun running joke, and anytime we needed a genuine smile I just had to remind him to give his model face. "Ok, now BLUE STEEL!"

^ Insert cheering here. Yaaaaay....

As I've mentioned before, I am addicted to color, and so I think this ferris wheel below is amazing.

This next one on the left is definitely where Darron the Model shines...

Take a look at the complete set of the formals at Santa Monica here.

Erin and Cole- Beach Formals

Went to Newport Beach, Ca to shoot a wedding for Erin and Cole, and we were able to do a pre-wedding-day bride and groom shoot at a resort in Laguna Niguel. It was a beautiful location, and Erin kept getting compliments right and left from the people passing by. There was one little girl in particular who was extremely excited to "see the princess". :)

Cole surprised Erin with very sparkly wedding band to go along with her engagement ring.

You can see more photos of Erin and Cole here.

Never strikes twice

This is my favorite photo from an engagement shoot earlier this summer. No photoshop needed... just a kiss and the summer sky. :)

Sodja Wedding

I'm dreadfully behind on my blog posts, but the as the insanity of the summer wedding rush is passing, here's a few photos from one of the first weddings this summer.
Wedding: LDS Bountiful Temple Luncheon: Wight House Reception: Eldredge Manor

Brittany and Scott

People can meet and fall in love in the most unexpected places. When Brittany signed up for an art class at BYU, she probably wasn't expecting to meet the love of her life, and she certainly wouldn't have predicted the circumstances. I mean, when you picture meeting "the one" for the very first time, they would normally have their clothes on, right? :)
As it turns out, Brittany spent hours sketching her future husband with a roomful of people, all while he sported nothing but a blue speedo (no nude models due to the policies of the church-run campus). I guess it gives a new meaning to the phrase "Love at first sight."
Brittany and Scott were very fun to shoot, and were easy to work with. We got quite a bit of rain (not that you would necessarily notice in the photos), but they were gung ho about the whole process and happily tramped around anywhere I suggested.

To see more photos from Brittany and Scott's engagement photos, click here.

Erin's Bridals- Cascade Springs and Alpine Loop

As I mentioned when I did their engagments, Erin has a lot of experience in front of a camera. She works for KSL and is also a reporter for BYU-TV, so she is quite at home with with situation. For her bridal photos, we trekked on up to Cascade Springs and a few other spots along the Alpine Loop. It turned out to be a gorgeous day.
This first one is probably my favorite out of the set.

The full gallery can be found on smugmug here.

Shauna and Andrew

For Shauna and Andrew's engagement photos we decided to head on up to downtown Salt Lake City and focus on Memory Grove Park as well as a few locations around the U of U campus. Lots of nice sunlight that day, and we ended up with a lot of photos they were really happy with to show off how much they love each other.

Piggy back rides- equally cool when you're 5 and when you're engaged. ...Or really just any time. :D

I love it when a guy tries out the kissy-face.

Take a look at the full engagement gallery here.